Following a Crucified God and Letting Go of Being Right

The Place Where We Are Right

by Yehuda Amichai

From the place where we are right
flowers will never grow
in the Spring.

The place where we are right
is hard and trampled
like a yard.

But doubts and loves
dig up the world
like a mole, a plough.
And a whisper will be heard in the place
where the ruined
house once stood.

I often think about deleting my Facebook account. I like to keep up with my friends, but scrolling through my news feed can feel like watching a bar fight, and it’s a brawl that I’ve jumped into from time to time. My news feed is sometimes a strange and exhausting place where usually nice folks are doing the equivalent of yelling at each other at the top of their lungs between pictures of cute kids, food, pets, and funny videos. I’ve heard it said that the quickest way to lose your faith in humanity is to read the comment sections of websites. The same can be said for logging into Facebook. It has become a place for many where the name of the game is to win arguments–to be right. Proving others wrong becomes a necessity. This has caused me to reflect on the ever present pursuit of winning and what it means for those of us who follow a crucified God.

When I see Jesus on the cross, I see a suffering God. I see a God whose very nature is to ask for forgiveness on behalf of those who are torturing, mocking, and violating him in the most dehumanizing ways. Jesus lives the sermon on the mount in his crucifixion. He turns the other cheek. He prays for those who persecute him. He walks the extra mile. And when I think of this, I feel the dissonance between this crucified, suffering God and those of us following this God who are screaming at one another online until we’re blue in the face. As followers of a crucified God, being right or winning an argument is missing the point.

There is a prayer in the Book of Common Prayer that I’ve been meditating on: “Lord Jesus Christ, you stretched out your arms of love on the hard wood of the cross that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace…” Isn’t that what we are called to? To join this long-suffering God on the cross and open up ourselves in the movement of God’s self-giving love? Maybe instead of trying to win arguments, we’ll seek to love all people, not just the ones who agree with us. Maybe the way of love will lead us to choose to lose. Maybe we will turn the other cheek. Maybe we’ll let others have the last word because we realize that we aren’t called to win arguments but, as the baptismal covenant in the Book of Common Prayer says, to “strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being.”

To be sure, there are times when we need to speak and stand up for justice, when remaining silent would be wrong. But I’m convinced that it has to come out of a place of deep love rather than the desire to control and dominate others. I think of my own life and I know that I’ve never been argued into wholeness or peace or love. And I look back with pain at the times when I’ve tried to dominate others in my pursuit of being right.

I pray that doubts and loves will break up the hard ground of the place where I am right, where flowers will not grow. Will you join me?